SriLankan’s Re-fleeting Exercise

SriLankan Airlines ( UL ) has started refleeting its fleet with replacing older Airbus A320s with newer machines. The first of which, arrived at Colombo International ( CMB ) on 30th Nov, 2008 .

The first aircraft to join the fleet, an Airbus A320-200, was acquired on a three year lease from AWAS of Ireland is now being repainted at UL’s facilities.

The equipment is msn 2908 ( pictured ), an A320-232, and was first flown on 19/09/2006. The machine was previously leased to Air Deccan under the Indian registration of VT-ADT and sadly I was unable to find any photos of this bird as you can see is occupied with IAE V2500 engines which rest of the UL’s A320s have. It is yet unknown whether the aircraft will be registred under Sri Lankan registry.

Another A320 is set to arrive soon and the oldest A320 in fleet ( not sure which one is, oldest registered aircraft , 4R-ABB, is not actually the oldest one in worldwide use ) would be phased out soon. It seems that the fleet size would stay the same with only the old aircraft replaced and none new added. But it’d be always great to see UL getting some new A330s, which seem to be a better investment under current industry levels.

P.S: If registered in Sri Lanka, the new A320 would be 4R-ABG.
Probably the next aircraft to join would be msn2914, previously with Air Deccan as VT-ADS and stored at Goodyear ( GYR ), just like msn2908 was. Also of interest to notice is that this is the first time UL has taken delivery of any aircraft since 2004.